Why You Should Delete Your MySpace Account

Today I am deleting all the content from my Myspace account and leaving only this notice. I’ve been inspired by the Franklin Street Statement and Identi.ca and I realize that a free/libre/open source internet is still possible, but it will require us to stop supporting corporate websites such as myspace. Here are some good reasons to delete your Myspace page, and support alternatives not run by corporations.

1. I’m tired of being free labor for the Fox corporation. The right wing Fox news corporation owns myspace, and I’m not going to support them any longer by giving them my content, my writing and images and information about who my friends are, for free. I don’t support war, the way the Fox corporation has, and I don’t want to provide them with more money to spread more pro-war propaganda. According to their license, Myspace has full rights to use my content things like advertisements for Myspace.

2. I actually care about my friends, and don’t want to screw them over my making them a “friend” on Myspace. By using myspace, I’m forcing my friends to sign up for a corporate owned, ad ridden, heteronormative web service if they want to stay in touch with me. The way that we don’t want to delete our accounts because we want to stay in touch with friends or fans of our bands just shows how dependent we already are on Myspace’s corporate controlled environment. We’re forced into a compulsory relationship we don’t want because we want to “keep in touch” with our friends?

3. I’m tired up updating so many websites because Myspace refuses to be interoperable with other websites. Myspace and sites like it do not allow you to download your data or automatically send it to other social networking sites because they want to force you into the jail of their website. Why? Why don’t we demand open social networking standards and the ability to download our own content?

4. I have a good Free/Libre/Open Source alternative, my own blog. You can read about what I’m up to at http://technotrannyslut.com , free of ads for bad movies and music, free of binary gender choices and heteronormative options for your relationships. Sites like Identi.ca provide ethical, non-corporate controlled alternatives to sites like Twitter. You can keep up with my status on Identi.ca, and sign up for your own microblog, here: http://identi.ca/djlotu5 Help create a well known list of alternatives like Identi.ca/Twitter , Opensim/Secondlife, if you now of any, by posting a comment here:

Actually, even better than deleting your account, just delete all the content and post a notice like this one.

This is just the beginning, I’m planning on getting off of Facebook and other web services as well, and I hope you do too. We can have an internet that is Free/Libre/Open Source, but only if we stop supporting the corporate, locked down options we’ve been using all of these years. As these services become more a part of our lives and get into our phones and our everyday communications, it is critical that we fight for our freedom. The Free/Libre/Open Source movement needs to expand from just writing software, into creating networks of servers and services, like Indymedia has done for so many years. Software alone is not enough in a networked service ecology, where servers, cables, wireless networks, infrastructure that we all control is essential if we want freedom. I hope to see you back on the Free/Libre/Open Source internet. Bye.